The next morning, Saige woke up to her alarm blaring. She hit the Snooze bar and got up for the day. She went down to the kitchen, still wearing her pajamas. While she was making herself a bowl of cereal, Saige's mom came into the kitchen.

"Good morning, princess," Saige's mom said.

"Hey Mom," said Saige. "Hard to believe I was a boy 24 hours ago."

Her mom laughed. "I know. I have to leave in twenty minutes, so you should take a shower real soon."

"What?"

"A shower," said Saige's mom. "I think I should show you how to dry yourself and do your hair and nails."

"Okay," said Saige. She finished her cereal and went into the bathroom. She left the door unlocked as she took off all her clothes. She sat down on the toilet to pee before getting in the shower.

"Just let me know when you're done in the shower," Saige's mom told her, opening the door a crack.

"I will," said Saige.

Saige took a shower, which really wasn't that much different from showering as a boy. She still had to soap down her whole body, and she had a little more hair to shampoo. But overall, it wasn't any harder than before.

After Saige turned off the water, she called out to her mom. "I'm done now!"

"Okay," Saige's mom said. She came into the bathroom as Saige took a towel off the towel rack. "So I know you're used to wrapping a towel around your waist, but when you're a girl, you need to wrap it around your whole body."

"How do I do that?" Saige asked.

"Here, let me help you," her mom said. She took the towel and wrapped it around Saige's torso. Saige's mom made sure the towel covered Saige's breasts, while still being long enough to cover her vagina and butt. "You gotta make sure you hide your private parts."

"It feels nice," said Saige as she tightened the towel. She could still see her cleavage, but her nipples were hidden.

"Now you gotta wrap another towel around your hair," said Saige's mom. She helped her daughter wrap all her hair up in a towel, which sat on her head like an enormous hat.

"I look like a Muslim," Saige said, looking in the mirror.

Her mother laughed. "Don't worry, you can take it off in a little bit. Right now, let's do your nails."

Saige's mom helped her put pink nail polish on her fingernails and toenails. But when they were done, it was time for Saige's mom to go to work.

"So when you take off your towel, just make sure you use the hair dryer to finish drying your hair," Saige's mom said as she was getting her purse. "And then brush it so it doesn't get matted or tangled."

"Got it," said Saige. She went into her bedroom and got some clothes to put on. Her outfit for today was a gray tank top, blue jeans, and black sandals. Once she had her clothes on, she went back into the bathroom and took the towel off her head. She used the electric hair dryer to finish drying off her hair. When she was done, she took her mom's hairbrush and started brushing. At first it hurt, to pull the tangles out of her long hair. But when she was done, her hair looked great.

Half an hour later, it was time for Saige to go to her first full day of school as a girl. She got her backpack full of textbooks and notebooks, as well as her new purse with her cell phone, wallet, and other stuff. She went to her first class, which was English. To her surprise, Mrs. Netherton (the teacher) didn't bat an eye at Saige's gender change. The role call sheet had changed Sage to Saige. Some of Saige's classmates looked at her funny, but no questions were asked.

After English, Saige had P. E. She wasn't too worried about P. E, since the school's P. E. clothes were designed to fit both boys and girls. Unfortunately, Saige almost walked into the boy's locker room. At the last second, Saige realized what she was doing and turned away from the threshold. Lucky for her, no one saw that she almost went into the wrong locker room.

In the girl's locker room, Saige ran into Olivia once again. This time, Olivia's friends Bailey and Stephanie were with her. "Hey Saige," said Olivia.

"Oh, hi Olivia," said Saige. "How are you?"

"I'm doing well," Olivia said as she put on her P. E. shirt. "You?"

"I'm fine," said Saige. "But I almost went into the boy's locker room."

"Oh my," said Stephanie. "I'll bet that was awkward."

"It was," said Saige.

"We heard you used to be a boy," said Bailey. "Olivia told us."

"You did what?" Saige asked.

"It's okay, we know what it's like," said Stephanie. "We've dealt with this before."

"You have?" Saige asked. "When?"

"It's a long story," said Bailey. "We should probably tell you later. Maybe at lunch?"

"I guess so," said Saige. She had been planning on trying to talk to her old friend Tony Carson at lunch, to try and tell him she was a girl now, but she was relieved to put it off. She had no idea how she'd do it, and she wasn't even sure Tony would believe her.

***

At lunch, Saige went to the table where she knew Olivia hung out with Bailey and Stephanie. She sat down with them and said, "Okay guys. What's your story?"

"It's a long one," said Olivia. "You see, Stephanie and I used to be boys too."

"What?" said Saige. "Did you use that girl's bathroom here?"

"No, no," said Olivia. "We were turned into girls by a witch."

"I thought witches were a myth," said Saige.

"They aren't," said Olivia. "At least not this one."

"She's running a foster home in Evanston," said Bailey. "What she does is, she takes in orphaned kids to live in her foster home. If they're boys, which is most of the time, then she turns them into girls."

"Why does she do that?" Saige asked.

"She doesn't like boys," said Olivia. "She wants girls to take over, I guess."

"But we didn't know that at first," said Bailey. "Especially me. I was already a girl to begin with. But then a few weeks ago, when Olivia first showed up, Stephanie accidentally told us she used to be a guy."

"We're not allowed to do that," said Stephanie. "So Miss Johnson-she's the witch-she took me to be terminated."

"What does that mean?"

"She was going to use my X chromosomes in her potion that turned boys into girls, and then have me die," said Stephanie.

"Then Bailey and I found Miss Johnson's lab and then got terminated ourselves," said Olivia. "But our dormmates came and rescued us."

"Did they get terminated?" Saige asked.

"We don't know," said Olivia. "We were all able to escape. Miss Johnson didn't even know that Valeria and Piper and Sarah saved us."

"And then we came here and moved in to Mr. Hart's orphanage," said Bailey. "His place is coed. So we've got some boys living with us."

"But does Miss Johnson still do their thing?" Saige asked. "Like, does she still turn boys into girls against their will?"

"We don't know," said Olivia. "We've been trying to put the whole thing behind us."

"I'm curious," said Saige. She pulled out her phone and opened up Google. "What's her foster home called?"

"The Y. F. F. H," said Bailey. "Young Forever Foster Home."

Saige entered that into Google and looked at the search results. The Y. F. F. H. was a foster home in Evanston, Illinois. "Is this it?" Saige asked, showing it to Olivia.

"It is," said Olivia. "Is it still running?"

Saige scrolled through the News tab. "I think it is," she said. "I don't see any articles about Miss Johnson getting sued or anything."

"Well, she should be," Stephanie grumbled.

"Why didn't you guys do anything?" Saige asked. "Why didn't you tell the police about this?"

"Because they wouldn't believe us," said Olivia.

"You have witnesses!" said Saige. "Those girls that rescued you-they could be witnesses!"

"This is magic we're talking about," said Bailey. "The cops aren't going to believe anything about magic."

"Besides, we're only teenagers," said Olivia. "It would be our word against Miss Johnson's."

Saige sighed. "You're right," she said. "Some things are just beyond our power."

It was silent for the next few minutes at that lunch table. The silence was broken when Tony Carson came up to their table. "Hey Sage," he said. "I heard you're a girl now."

Saige looked up. "How did you know that?"

"Mrs. Whatcott told me," said Tony. "I was wondering where you've been since yesterday, so I went to the attendance office to see if you were here today. And Mrs. Whatcott told me your identity had been changed to Saige."

"And you believed her?" Saige asked, surprised.

"Not at first," said Tony. "She showed me your picture, and I've been looking for you ever since."

"So...you believe me?" Saige asked. "When I say I'm Sage?"

"I mean..." Tony tilted his head at Saige. He looked kind of cute, with his brown eyebrow raised, and his hair tousled to the side...did Saige just think that?

"Where did we first meet?" Tony asked.

"Third grade," said Saige. "Mr. Boyd's class."

Tony thought for a moment before saying, "What's my middle name?"

"Noah," said Saige. "And you hate it because it's your dad's middle name."

Tony nodded. "So you are Sage. Er, Saige with an 'i.'"

"Wanna sit with us?" Saige asked.

"Of course!" said Tony. He sat down next to Saige. For some reason, Saige felt a rush of pleasure at Tony sitting next to her. She was only now realizing how handsome Tony was.

Tony, Saige, Olivia, Bailey, and Stephanie spent the rest of lunch chatting it up, until the bell rang. But they agreed to hang out at lunch again the next day.